From Here to There And Back Again

A Hamilton's Tale

Ever wonder how two reasonably sensible people could end up moving 8 times in 10 years and not be in the oil business? I've been thinking a lot about that with this latest move under our belts. I figured I'd cure the world of insomnia and answer it here.

Boy meets girl. Boy and girl fall in love and they get married in 1999. Move #1 occurred when boy and girl move into together after the nuptials were exchanged.

Brandon was working at a local furniture store in Abilene. Nothing to write home about, but it paid the bills. It wasn't long into that job that the company decided to downsize, so Brandon being the newest, was tossed out like yesterday's news. We both thought it would be an exciting 'adventure' to move to a big city, dumped our Abilene apartment and moved to Austin, Texas in 2000. Move #2.

Well, after about a year of apartment dwelling in Austin and having double income, no kids it was time for the Hamiltonians to move up in the world. They decided it would be most glamorous to build a new house instead of buying a 'used' one. The house was completed in late 2001. Move #3.

After getting settled in their new digs, the baby train was stopping through, so they decided they might as well have one of the little stinkers. Having a kid and staying longer in lucrative jobs grounded them there for about 3 years. However, Brandon had his mid-life career crisis extremely early and discovered he could not work for Samsung for the rest of his career and still be happy. Come on, we all know THIS story seeing as how it's been told hundreds of times....But here's the shortest version possible. Becky agreed to work full-time so that B-Dog could go back to school full time on one condition only; They relocate the family to Midland so that baby Hamilton could have grandparents caring for him instead of a day care center. B-Dog agreed. Move #4 was into the Davis household in Dec 2004 so that they could save some green and also because the Austin house had not yet sold when they moved. A mortgage and a rent was not do-able on Becky's salary alone.

Well, here's where the sensible people started doing things not quite as sensible as sensible could be. Immediately upon arriving to Midland, the baby train made an unexpected, yet welcomed, stop for the Hamiltons. However, with our little family growing and despite the Davis' hospitality, we needed our own space. Move #5 was into a small 2 bedroom, 1.5 bath townhouse - What we could afford at the time. Afford it or not, times were lean.

After a year in the townhouse, we learned of a deal where we could live in a house with a backyard for dollars more than the tiny townhouse we were in. This was probably not our best decision. Enter Move #6. There was indeed more space and there was the benefit of being very close to the Hamiltons Sr. BUT the house was a fixer-upper and we were still just throwing money away into fixing it up and rent payments. Hmmmmm, probably not too 'sensible.'

After two years in the money pit, we took the Dave Ramsey course "Financial Peace University." It radically changed how we thought about money. We started to make better choices, although not ALL of our choices to that point were bad or anything. We just did 'better.' We opted to get out of the money pit and live with parents again, under the notion that we would be paying off a little debt and saving for a house. Move #7 - Back into the parent's house.

Ahhhhh, here's where the story gets sweet. While we didn't reach every single initiative we had intended financially while living with parents, Uncle Sam decided to offer $8000 to whomever wanted to live in their own house. Yes, we'd like that please! We found out that we indeed qualified for this program, so throwing caution to the wind (and banking on Uncle Sam coming through), we just completed Move #8. 2009

This is where the story ends. Eight moves in ten years of marriage. Go figure. Don't expect there to be a 'to be continued' to this story. We would like to get off the baby train and moving express now. Thanks...